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Friday, October 09, 2015

Cronos Parasite Engine Conversion Complete! (Flesh Friday)

I posted my thoughts on the Cronos Parasite Engine model a while back. The summary was that, though I love everything about the Talos/Cronos kit and all Our Man Jes did with it, when I hear the description of the Cronos as a soul-sucking parasite, I picture something far worse than the be-tentacled-but-faceless existing Cronos plastic model.

I picture an insatiable, avaristic horror: a gaping, needle sharp maw stretched wide as it hungers for souls. I picture this:

A twisted, dangerous, grasping thing. A soul vaccuum. A monster from under your bed. An utter nightmare from your darkest dreamings.

So I built it, and I'm pretty damn happy with the results. Here's a rough, 360 tour:

When I was coming up with the concept for this model, I wanted to push the soul-sucking angle. I wanted it to have not just one gaping, soul-sucking mouth, but other mouths growing from its body.

I dialed it back a bit, adding one additional one to the chest...

...but I also tried to model gaping maws on the thing's palms, as if they, too, were weapons. They didn't turn out 100% as I was intending, but they are still pretty horrific.

I really like the creepy way that the hands turned out in general, and they were inspired by the massive, twisted flesh gauntlet I gave my converted Grotesque Aberation.

To keep the family resemblance and link the Parasite Engine back to my other instances of Cronos parasites in the coven, I incised the Cronos with some sick tribal tatts that would be well at home in your average frat house:

They were also intended to cover the empty sockets along the side of the talos torso: one more place where I tried to obliterate the majority of the mechanical components on the Cronos to even further differentiate it from the Talos.

Last, but not least: the soul pit on the creature's back, popularly nicknamed "The Punchbowl of souls"! this was reverse-stamped from the Spirit Vortex (?) that comes with the Cronos model.

It's kind of tough to get at with that spine arcing up over it, but hopefully you get the idea. My concept is that once the Cronos sucks the soul out of a victim, the soul descends into the punchbowl through the gribbly bit at the end of the spinal column. I played with the idea of modeling a soul on the end of it, but Brother Pink told me it would look too busy, and I think that was wise.

The only other thing I really need to do is create a victim model, which is levitating in front of the Cronos, right in the middle of having his soul sucked out >:)

So let me know what you think of this nightmare engine, and be sure to check back next Flesh Friday for another addition to the Big Happy Cronos Parasitic Family!

16 comments:

F@&King glorious! Seriously dude you have outdone yourself. I absolutely love it. What a great idea fantastically realised. I like it as is and don't think you need to add the victim. I almost feel that would take away from the creepiness and terror of the Cronos somehow

Thanks brother! Interesting thought about the victim. I have this penchant for turning anything into a diorama, if the base is big enough. I never considered that the victim would do anything but add to the model. I'm glad you said something :)

Well, if you and NafNaf are agreed, then it's not happening. The Cronos shall continue to ride alone!

And thanks for saying that it strikes you as a center piece model. When I'm in the trenches working on something, I get so used to looking at it that it no longer impresses me. When I finished the Cronos, I was still pretty happy about it, but the excitement had bled off. Then I took it into the local GW yesterday to show the dudes. It was primed grey at that point, and one of the blackshirts asked me if the model was 3rd party...as in, had I bought it somewhere else. I pointed out all the cronos/talos bits, then showed him these pictures as proof I'd just greenstuffed it.

All that is to say that I really appreciate all of this praise. You all help me see the model through new eyes!

Sweet! Thanks, Jeff, particularly since the hands are pretty distended, so I'm happy to hear that they still work for people. If you look closely at the backs of them, one is less incredible than the other, but shhhhh....

I'm thinking I'll try sculpting more hands like this to represent the Talos Flesh gauntlets.

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This is the hobby blog of Mr Pink, with the occassional interruption by his brother, Nuffsed. We create conversions of Games Workshop models (mostly) for Tyranids, Dark Eldar, Tau and Blood Angels (again, mostly). Mr Pink also offers tutorials on how to sculpt miniatures.

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